Bukowski
by LynnAgate
Summary: While preparing for a supply run, Max and Alec have a fight. Disclaimer: Dark Angel is owned by James Cameron and Charles H. Eglee. For entertainment purposes only.


Even if almost all of Terminal City's high-level officers hadn't been in the Situation Room at Command when it started, it still would have been one hell of a fight, and every transgenic within earshot still would have heard it.

Alec had called an emergency meeting to plan what would be TC's greatest medical and arsenal supply run. He already had intel on a supposedly enormous stash out at a presumed abandoned military base, and he had a rough idea of just how to pull it all off.

Of course, the genesis of the fight was not just that Max showed up late, but also how she showed up: stomping, yelling, probably already pissed off for a number of reasons – who knew why?

He had really only meant it in jest, but he had said it anyway. "Nice of you to show up, Maxie."

"Cut the shit, Alec," she had hissed back, unwilling to entertain his particular line of bull for even just one minute. She smiled facetiously.

Alec tilted his head with a jerk and returned to the blueprints of the base, pointing along the perimeter. "Mole, you and me'll go in here," he said, then took another breath, preparing to point to another entry point on the plans.

"You should probably think about splitting up," Max interjected, standing. Alec didn't realize that if he didn't consider that this base _wasn't_ as abandoned as he was told, one or both of them could end up dead or captured. "That way," she began, walking to the front to show him on the prints where a better place was to gain access.

Before she reached the plans, Alec interrupted. "As I said, Mole and I will enter the compound here," he said, irritated. There was so much force in his voice and gestures that his pointing on the plans tapped loud enough that even the transgenics outside the room would be able to pick up on it.

"Why would you risk op failure by gaining access at the tactically weakest point?" she countered. She pointed at another route. "This would give you a better advantage."

Alec's green eyes lit up. If it was possible for green to catch fire, Alec's eyes were combusting. "Why do you insist on pretending like you know everything?"

Max returned his anger with her own, which was building at ridiculous speed. "I don't! I just know more than you!"

"Excuse me, Miss Better-Than-Alec. Were you a decorated officer at Manticore? You know, the Military Academy we all went to for over fifteen years? Oh, wait, that's right. You can't excel at missions since you opted for the coward's way out, 09-er!"

"You're proud to call yourself a murderer?"

Mole sat back in his chair, biting on his cigar, with a huge smile. "This is better than TV!" he said to Kabe, another X5 seated next to him.

"You're just pissed off 'cause we escaped that hell-hole!" she continued, almost spitting on Alec.

"No, I'm pissed off because you're micro-managing everything I do!"

"I wouldn't have to if you weren't risking everyone's lives with your asinine plans!"

Alec took a deep breath and turned to the other officers in the room. "Get out," he ordered.

Everyone knew this meant business and evacuated the room quickly.

"If Twinkle Toes dies, I get his apartment," Mole said.

When the door finally shut, Alec looked back to Max.

"Not my fault you won't listen to reason," she defended, crossing her arms.

"And it's not my fault you won't even listen to the plan. Damn it, Max, what is this really about? Is it about Logan? 'Cause I'm fed up with being your scapegoat and your punching bag."

This was _so_ not about Logan. Max growled and said, "Why do you have to be this way?"

"It's a gift," he smarted.

"Who would even want to be such an asshole?"

"Who would even want to be such a control freak?" Alec stepped closer to her, preparing for the fight.

Max huffed, also preparing for what she thought would be a serious fist fight. She pulled her fist back in a blur and launched it at Alec's face.

Alec dodged it and caught her arm. "Why don't you trust me, Max?" he asked.

And that was it. That was the last thing he said before she broke. In the quietest voice she'd used since she told him about Ben, she said, "I do. I just – can't lose you, too."

Alec let her arm fall and she stared up at him. "What?" he found himself asking.

A tear slipped out of her right eye and Max broke eye contact, ashamed to have admitted what she did with her statement. The tear made a track down her face – a track Alec interrupted with an instinctual smear of his thumb.

Max looked back to him, feeling the warmth of his palm. Alec had stepped closer and continued cupping her face. He tried to lift her chin up so he could look in her eyes and maybe read her mind, or do something, anything that would help him decode what she was trying to say.

Max stood on her tiptoes, raised her hand to his arm, and squeezed his upper arm, pulling him closer.

Outside the Situation Rom, Mole and the others watched the door and listened for anything but the silence.


End file.
